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Apple Under Pressure As Samsung Preps Foldable Screens For 2012

Mock-up of a Samsung phone with plastic-based OLED screen folded over the sides; via Nomura Research

The world’s biggest smartphone makers were all trying to out-shine their competitors at this year’s Mobile World Congress, with most new devices boasting the same, large, flat screen with a button or two. Differentiation was in the details. To be among top dogs like Samsung and the increasingly-popular ZTE, phones needed a quad-core processor, shiny AMOLED screen and to be slim and light.

Apple was the elephant in the room. It refused to exhibit, even though its iPhone and iPad were top-selling devices. But both Apple and its competitors may be under pressure to leap to the next level of hardware in 2012, and not just by being more slim or more shiny.

Samsung is using its plastic-backed AMOLED devices to make phones that are lighter, thinner and include “foldable screens,” according to Richard Windsor, a senior technology analyst at Nomura Group.

Nomura’s analysts in Asia have said they expect to see Samsung “apply plastic substrate-based, bendable or curved displays for smartphones from [the second quarter of] 2012,” and cite equipment manufacturers in Korea as their sources.

The analysts added in a recent note that the first example of this technology would not be in a smartphone screen that folded in half (though that may come later in 2013 in a clam-shell like device), but in a screen that folded over the edges of a phone, replacing the usual screen border or “bezel” so that the display continued onto the sides (see image above). The display would be “unbreakable and increases the exceptionally slim form-factor,” they said.

“We expect Samsung to mass produce such panels for smartphones in 2012, which we believe would be more popular that the current OLED display equipped in SEC’s Galaxy S II,” Nomura’s analysts said, adding that the use of film-coating technology and tempered plastic would reduce the weight of Samsung’s tablet computers by 30%.

“Plastic displays will change the perception of handsets and tablet PCs in terms of design, thickness, and weight, and this would clearly differentiate Samsung’s products from others, in our view,” said the analysts. “This is why we like Samsung.”

Example of seamless foldable display from Samsung; via PhysOrg.com

This isn’t the first talk of foldable screens from Samsung. Last year rumors swirled that Samsung was working on a bendable phone called the Galaxy Skin, to be released in the second quarter of 2012. Samsung has denied the product exists; the images of the branded prototype came from a design student’s conceptual project.

However Samsung has said publicly that it is working on “next-generation technologies such as foldable, flexible and transparent displays.” And already a year ago at the Consumer Electronics Show 2011, it showed off bendable AMOLED screens that were 0.3mm thick and 4.5 inches across. Later in May, it was reported that researchers from the Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology had built a prototype display that folded in the middle without a crease.

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1. Apple did not pay samsung royalties for using their 3G wireless technology patent 2. Watch pirates of silicon valley Wait…you guys are apple fans…shouldn’t you know EVERYthing about steve jobs then? What? You didnt know he was the biggest most BLATANT THIEF in the world?? You actually didn’t know how he even got the company started? By going to the Xerox lab and stealing, literally packing up all their brand new innovations and marketing it as apple’s? Just like how they have siri respond that it was created by apple, when it was a startup company that apple bought out?

Jobs is a soul-less thief who has the audacity to accuse others of doing things that he would do at a greater extreme. Selfish hypocrite. And you guys just bought into his lies.

lrd555 – Heh. That is a whole other story. I did ask Samsung at MWC about how aggressively they would continue pursuing patent litigation against Apple (2011 was a whopper year between the two), but their exec didn’t want to say!

Have you seen ALL of the lineup of samsung android phones on the market? Different submodels for each nation and sometimes carriers (like in US) look different. Some are hideous. Most don’t look like iphone.

And don’t forget apple and engadget (which other mainstream media copy photos from) been releasing photoshopped images of samsung phones. Ex.1 App Drawer of samsung galaxy phones are shown as if it’s what users first see when phone is turned on, which is NOT true. Ex.2 Samsung phone size looks same as iphone which is not true. Ex.3 Lawyers for Apple in Germany changed aspect ratio of Galaxy Tablet (wide aspect -> 4:3) in images of Samsung Tablet in OFFICIAL court filings. All of the above are widely discussed topics which main stream media don’t bother to really talk about. They most repeat apple’s line that samsung blatantly copies and most believe it without really looking into it.

Lastly, I thought Apple was after Android. I thought they wanted to destroy android. so why are they suing samsung/htc/motorola and not Google? Scared much?

Apple provides 3-6% of total revenue of Samsung group. Sure apple is biggest customer but it’s not like 50%, which again main stream media never bothers to mention when reporting that apple is samsung’s biggest customer.

Unless the battery folds along the backside of the screen this is at best a novelty.

Anyone notice how the screen slides out of a hard case and remains tethered for power? Neat. Cool. No mass market.

I see plenty of desktop applications but it’s a total failure in the moblie smartphone or tablet space. Plus Samsung doesn’t make desktop computers (devices) which is the only volume market for this device.

Just looks like another opportunity for Apple to.. how did that Nike slogan go “just do it” or in Apple speak “just do it right”.

A corrrectly done device doesn’t crack like a mother and have antennae failure – not to mmention severe voice quuality problems. Yes samsung recieved the Best Device Maker/Hardware Manufacturer award at the MWC 2012. Not to mention the best smartphone, AGAIN, after T3 international best smartphone award.

Apple makes inferior devices and charges a lot because they have a great marketing team headed by Jobs initially. NOT due to qualitty.